Chapter 15: Chapter 15: First Day at Adventure High

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

First Day at Adventure High

---

 

Divah always said that any publicity was good publicity. Even if it was turned in a wholly negative direction. So, it didn’t bother me too much when I noticed that novices were beginning to whisper behind my back since morning P.E.’s flashy ending. Come to think of it, they didn’t mind whispering about me in front of me either.

“That’s him...” a cloud-haired nymph whispered to her horned male friend who I assumed was a satyr because of his hairy goat legs.

They were both wearing the green cloaks that marked them as novices of the Rogues Gallery.

“Him?” the satyr asked.  

“That crazy mage who put most of the Warrior-One class in the healing tents for burn treatments,” the cloud nymph explained in a loud enough voice that she must have known would reach my ears.

“Oh, vargr, I heard about that… They say he burned Bjorn’s face with high-level fire magic that no one’s ever even seen before,” the satyr whispered back.

Bjorn was the name of the Viking dude who’d led the fight against me. And no, I didn’t burn his face off. I just gave him a tan which I think the pale teen bodybuilder needed desperately anyway.

“Nah, bro,” a third rumormonger—this blonde dwarf—walked right by me just so he could share some info about me to his friends that I was probably meant to hear. “If Doomsday hadn’t called off the match, that fool”—I swear to the gods that he just glanced my way then—“would have been knocked out to next weekend.”

Correction, he wasn’t a dwarf. Despite this blonde rumormonger’s small stature, he was far too thin. Dwarves were generally big-boned, and dwarven children had stubbles on their chins too. So, this kid might have been a gnome. Wasn’t sure as I’ve never met one.

“Why do you think that?” the cloud nymph asked.

“Ironborn Joe wasn’t in the fight,” the blonde dwarf revealed, causing the other two to gasp out loud.

Ironborn Joe… I almost laughed out loud. What sort of goofball gave himself that nickname?

Anyway, these whispers followed me around as I walked the narrow hallway of the Great Library’s third stack which was home to the lecture hall where my next class would be. My destination was Lecture Hall Five, but before I pushed open its door on the right side of the passage, I glanced over my shoulder and gave those three chatty green cloaks my patented wolf-eyed glare that I figured would help to feed the rumors of the crazy apprentice mage, which, if I was being honest, I kind of liked.

Whack!

A book about the size and weight of a brick smashed into my chest and nearly knocked the wind out of me.

“Oof,” I grunted. “What the Hel—”

I ducked away from another brick-sized tome hurtling toward me.

“Vargr!” someone cursed.

Books were being flung across Lecture Hall Five by the gale-force winds wrapped around the green cloak standing in the eye of what I could only describe as a tiny tornado.

She was over six feet tall with tan skin and thick, puffy white hair framing a cherub-like face; a wide button nose, big blue eyes, and puffy lips that were the same blue color as her irises. Lines of white swirls marked her skin similar to a certain half-giant instructor who’d hazed me in P.E. earlier.

Based on that description, I was reminded of an entry in the bestiary section of Divah’s journal that spoke of a rare breed of ‘jotuns’ who made their homes in the thick clouds above the frigid mountains of Jotunheim.

“She’s a half-cloud-giant,” I realized.

Facing down the half-giant and her homegrown tornado was another green cloak.

He was a lanky, fair-faced, sandy-haired elf with a kid’s goatee. Ljósálfar didn’t get facial hair so I assumed this elf was of a lesser breed. Maybe one of those woodland elves that were more common around the realms than the pompous bright elves who liked to lord over the other species.

“Duck!” called a bell-like voice I instantly recognized.

Instinct drove me to listen to Dess’s warning, but I quickly realized that ducking would do little to evade the stack of brick-sized books about to ram into me.

She dove in at the last minute and pushed me out of the way, sending us both crashing onto the third stack’s narrow corridor.

“Ugh…” I groaned. “Didn’t this already happen before?”  

“It does have a déjà vu quality to it, doesn’t it?” Dess giggled. “Oh, I’m sorry for the crash but my body—”

“Moves on its own when someone needs rescuing,” I finished for her.

Dess’s eyes widened in surprise, which was when I realized I’d just mentioned something she’d told me in a previous life.

“I do it too sometimes,” I lied quickly.

I took the long-fingered hand she offered me, and the fairy girl helped me back to my feet while those three green cloaks who were murmuring about me watched in rapt attention.

“You guys have nothing better to do, huh?” I asked.

The blonde gnome nodded. “Yeah, not really, bro.”

“Just don’t make our fall sound lame when you ‘chirp’ about it…” I noticed that the cloud nymph was already tapping away on her status bar’s screen, which I assumed was her telling her followers what she’d just witnessed via the ‘Chirper’ app that Liara explained earlier was how rumors were so quick to spread around campus.

“No promises,” the cloud nymph answered.

I shrugged and let it go, choosing instead to focus on my fairy savior and her sudden reappearance in my life so soon after I’d kicked her group’s collective butts. Dess wore the same maroon gambeson, khaki pants, and leather boots that I belatedly noticed were the standard gear for most warrior novices. Although the caveboy part of my mind could still recall her shapely legs, well-toned arms, and rock-hard abs from P.E. class’s spartan-style training.

Incidentally, with some help from Liara, Master Doomsday had finally forced me to abandon my lightweight scale mail for the blue robe top of a mage novice which looked a lot like a Japanese Karate Gi. My breathable brown slacks were traded in for itchy gray trousers, while my pair of white Under Armoury sneakers were replaced by these lame-o brown boots that lacked my sneaks’ enchanted speed buff. Sure, my new garments came with minor protection enchantments, but they were nothing compared to my old gear’s buffs. It’s why I’d insisted on wearing my blue aviator jacket over this novice gear as added protection—and because I had an image to keep.

My musings on Academy uniforms were summarily disrupted by the Krak-ka-boom of thunder which forced mine and Dess’s gazes to snap toward Lecture Hall Five’s open door.

“So,” I covered my face with my arm to avoid the harsh winds blowing out of the room beyond the door, “are they trying to kill each other or is this what Realmsverse History’s usually like?”

“Lohgan insulted Brunhilde about her height and claimed she was too clumsy to be a real green cloak and Brunhilde took offense and started hurtling wind magic at him,” Dess explained in rapid-fire speed.

“Who’s he to say if she’ll be a good rogue or not?” Yes, I did have a thing against people pigeonholing others into a stereotype. And to use height as a reason, well, that got my blood boiling. “I think a rogue giant’s a groovy idea.”

“Nobody says groovy these days,” Dess chirped.

My rejoinder about ‘groovy’ being my signature word got stuck in my throat though as something faster than my well-trained eyes could track breezed past me and Dess to get into Lecture Hall Five. A few seconds later, the gale-force winds stilled abruptly and both Brunhilde and Lohgan were lying flat on the ground while a shadowy figure pressed a foot on each of their backs.

“Tell me”—the scarlet-eyed woman’s icy voice caused a chill to climb up my spine and her anger wasn’t even trained on me—“which of you two delicious children thought it would be fun to mess up my class... hmm?”

A pair of fangs protruded out of the upper lip of a deathly pale face, leading me to the conclusion our Realmsverse History teacher was a freaking vampire, which, in retrospect, was an interesting choice for faculty. Mistress Ravenloft could educate us with a unique firsthand perspective of history while also being a constant threat to the teenage blood bags attending her classes.  

Sadly, we didn’t get any tales of blood pirates or realm conquistadors during this session. Thanks to Brunhilde going postal on Loghan, we novices spent the rest of the class cleaning up their mess. Mistress Ravenloft called it, “Shared responsibility,” and no one was brave enough to challenge the curly blonde vampire’s orders for fear of getting our blood sucked out of us.

You are reading story Adventure Academy at novel35.com

I stayed in the Great Library for lunch since Liara was nowhere to be found and I didn’t fancy trekking back to the tower just to eat with Zen and the gang. Besides, the special section was just a stack down, and I didn’t think Mistress Grimsever minded me invading it again. She didn’t. We spent lunch discussing the merits of protection charms against mid-tier black magic while also riffing on Divah who I just discovered was in the same mage class as Mistress Grimsever back when they were both novices of the Academy.

“Did she really steal Master Dwalinn’s staff so she could use it as a lightning rod to summon Thor to the Academy?” I recounted one of Divah’s far-fetched stories about summoning a god to campus so she could steal his fancy magical belt.

“She didn’t get Thor. She roped in one of his goats instead,” Mistress Grimsever revealed, chuckling as she did.

“That’s even funnier,” I said, laughing afterward. 

“Speaking of unconventional novices … I hear you’re proving to be just as much a rule flaunter as that wily dragon,” Mistress Grimsever noted. “More stew?”

I ate the goat stew she offered me with relish while also promising that she could expect me to top Divah’s records and shenanigans. “I’m go’on du’ big’er stu—;”

I choked on that chunk of goat that got caught in my throat, prompting the amiable half-orc to share some of her special tea with me.

“How very much like your master you are, Mr. Wisdom… She liked to speak with food in her mouth too,” Mistress Grimsever chuckled.

Since we mostly shared the same apprentice schedule, Dess and I met up outside Seidr Longhouse, the large building on the eastern side of campus’s central garden. From there, Dess led me past a ten-foot round entrance and into a spacious interior with a high vaulted ceiling, wooden panel walls decked in colorful banners, and a stone floor peppered with a series of arcane configurations ranging from protective magical arrays to summoning circles and even runic graffiti about silly stuff like, “Call Barbatos for all your feminine tantric needs,” I read aloud.  

I stared down at a long shape carved into the floor underneath the runic symbols that translated into the Chirper ID ‘Barbatos69.’ “Is that…?”

“Yep, it’s a phallus,” Dess replied indifferently. “Seidr Longhouse is all about self-expression.”

Smoke wafted out of the altar at the far end of Seidr Longhouse’s entry hall, sending the scent of lavender to hang in the air. Interestingly, most important places smelled of lavender or frankincense, aromas known to repel evil and negative thoughts. Supposedly. But, as I stepped over Barbatos69 and his dick drawing, I assumed lavender couldn’t beat out a teenager’s inner caveman at all.

Dess took me past more funny graffiti and through another set of side doors that led into a corridor with walls that looked like the inner workings of a watch; rotating metal cogs and screws and brass piping with ticking sounds reverberating all around us.

“Groovy,” I whispered.

“Sure, if you don’t mind stinking like motor oil for the rest of the day,” Dess piped up.

She shoved her way past the clusters of green, blue, and red cloaks clogging up the corridor and took me into a room that looked normal compared to the hallway we’d just come from.

Chandeliers hanging from the high ceiling lit up a typical laboratory space that had two lines of long tables arrayed in front of a blackboard at the other end of the room. The lab equipment was also standard fare; Dwarf burners, black cauldrons, brass beakers, silver filters, and potion vials—everything a budding mad alchemist might need to bottle fame, mix fortune into a salve, or just blow stuff up. The Apprentice Alchemy’s master, however, was more in line with what I now believed was the Academy’s preference in faculty.

Underneath his lab coat, Doctor Faustus was all rotting skin and yellowing bones with twin orbs of ghostly flame bursting out of his empty eye sockets. Yep, you guessed it, the master of Apprentice Alchemy was a draugr, and a weird one too. Apart from the way his rotten tongue kept licking at his lips, Faustus seemed quite docile for a card-carrying member of what many considered one of the evilest species in all the realmsverse.

“Hello, living beings.” His warm welcome was strangely energetic for an undead. “I see we’ve got some new faces today. What’s your name?”

No, he wasn’t pointing at me. He was pointing at Dess who was sitting beside me.

“I’m Dess, Doc,” she answered eagerly. Then she leaned in to whisper in my ear, “Faustus’s rotting brain makes him forget the small stuff. So, it helps to double-check the formulas he writes down on the board before we begin experiments.” 

“Good to know,” I whispered back.

Faustus asked some more novices their names before he went on to explain today’s assignment, which he likened to putting a temporary stopper on death. “It’s not as good as concocting an elixir of eternal life, but what we’ll create today will keep you alive in a hard fight!”

A novice raised his hand.

“Yes?” Faustus nodded.

I recognized the human who’d just gotten up. He was the blue cloak I spoke to back at P.E. The one who was shaking in his booties while the red cloaks marched at us.

He was lanky—seriously, why are most people in this Academy so freaking tall—and had short-cropped brown hair parted at the side. His face was thin and narrow. Thick dark eyebrows rose over big doe brown eyes and a long pointy nose marked by freckles.

“Um, we’ve only started learning the theory of healing items… and I don’t think anyone’s ready to put a stopper in death, sir,” the scaredy-cat stated.

Yes, I did just give him a crappy nickname which I will continue to call him until he proved me wrong. No, I wasn’t being mean. It’s not like I called him that out loud—yet. 

“Do you always take things so literally, uh”—Faustus frowned—“what was your name?”

“Bart, sir,” scaredy-cat answered.

“Ah, yes, Bartholomew, I remember now,” Faustus said absentmindedly. “As I was saying… What was I saying again?”

“Putting a stopper in death, doc,” Dess piped up.

“Ah yes, um…” he eyed Dess questioningly.

“Dess,” she supplied.

“Yes, yes… thank you, Desdemona,” He nodded wearily. “As I was saying, we will be making health potions!”

He tapped his fingers on the board that contained the formula for mixing a standard health potion, which I, after reading it once, realized was wrong. The formula Faustus had written down was for a famous poison called ‘Waking Death.’ It was advanced-level alchemy even I couldn’t concoct yet.

I pointed this out to him quickly as I noticed some of my fellow novices were already beginning preparations to make the thing that would have most likely ended in paralyzing them until they received the antidote, a rare salve called ‘True Love’s First Kiss.’

“Really?” Faustus glanced back at the board. Long seconds later, he exclaimed, “By the hoary ghost, you’re right!”

It took him another two tries, but he eventually wrote down the right formula for a lesser healing potion, which was honestly less groovy than that poison he’d first shown us.

I would have loved to try my skills on concocting a powerful poison—one could never have enough of those hidden in one’s sleeve—but the lame-o assignment did offer me a chance to show off, which is exactly what I did, and it would result in one of the freakiest encounters I would ever have in a class.

 

Glad tidings, fellow novices!

Will's school days truly begin in this chapter—and it won't be as easy as he might think. Even if it's just the apprentice classes. 

How about you guys? What do you miss most about your high school days that you'd like to see in the story too? Let me know in the comments and they may just come out in a future chapter! XD

Don't forget to FOLLOW and RATE the novel if you're enjoying it so far. Every little bit helps and we need your help to get more readers! Head to this link for that:

LASTLY: If you're interested in my writing, go check out my other work on Tapas:

10+ advanced chapters of Adventure Academy? We've got you covered! Go check out my Patreon. XD Link is in the donate button. 

 

You can find story with these keywords: Adventure Academy, Read Adventure Academy, Adventure Academy novel, Adventure Academy book, Adventure Academy story, Adventure Academy full, Adventure Academy Latest Chapter